Help! can't decide between condo or townouse

Well guys.. after a long time of lurking through TSL.. I need your help. I'm moving to Cincinnati soon and am looking to purchase within the city. I have looked at a lot of properties and narrowed it down to these two.. and cant decide which one I like more. Both have pros and cons, none that really make one property significantly better than the other.

I would love to hear your opinions on both. My biggest concern with purchasing is that I will need to sell it in 3-4 years and can't decide which of the two would be better for resale.

Here is the 1st place. Its a condo building that was completed about a year ago. There are only 4 units left in this building for sale. As far as I know none are being rented, they are all owner occupied. The unit I am looking at is 1100 sq feet 2bed 2 bath. It is a brand new unit that will be built with the upgrades(wood floor in bedroom and bathroom nice vanity in the bathroom,front load w/d) and color schemes I want.

The building is really nice. The area is towards the edge of Eden Park but starts becoming a little seedy about 1/2 mile away from this area. I drove through the neighborhood numerous times throughout the day and night and didn't see anything to be concerned about anywhere near the building. I talked with some of the people in the neighborhood who have lived there 50+ years and they said the neighborhood was going downhill until about 5-6 yrs ago when the city began trying to clean the area up and now is much nicer and safer and supposedly on the rise.

There is a park about a mile away from here with some development going on a few blocks away (apartment building, resteraunts, coffee house). There are a number of churches within a few blocks. The building is mostly young professionals, with some older residents but not many as far as I can tell.

Building from the front. Gated entrance to the Condo.

looking into the entrance hall from the kitchen.

comes with washer/dryer. can upgrade to front load which I would do

standing in the hall looking into kitchen/dining area. The living room is to the left of where I'm standing. I'm not sure why I didn't take pics of the living room or bedrooms

Can choose whatever color cabinets/counter top/floor I want

lots of natural light. I would have this cabinet and the one across from it with frosted glass rather than wood doors

dining area

2nd bedroom behind the kitchen, not sure what the real estate agent is looking at.

closet in 2nd bedroom

Guest bath

Master bath

looking out the living room window onto the parking lot. Each unit comes with one garage and one open parking spot

Neighborhood surrounding the building...this is the street behind it.. neighborhood is almost exclusively single family homes.

building is about a block down on the right

backside of building

This is the other place I'm looking at. Its a townhouse that is about 22 years old but the entire complex was renovated 4 years ago. It needs a little bit of work, but not much. I would get it repainted and at some point in the future put granite in the kitchen and change out the bathrooms and replace the carpet with wood floors.

This townhouse is in a building with 4 others and there are a total of 5 buildings in this little complex. It is surrounded by other condos/townhouses and is 1 block away from the biggest park in Cincinnati, you can walk there from this place. If you step out of the building and go down the stairs to the main street you can see downtown and the city skyline. Its in the really nice part of Eden Park and is about 1/2 mile away from the interstate. It does not have a garage or covered parking but rather one designated spot (which isn't a corner spot sadly)

The townhouse has awesome natural lighting (although the main windows look out onto the parking lot) and is 3 floors. There are 2 bedrooms each with its own bathroom on the top floor. The living room is on the middle floor and on the bottom floor is the kitchen, dining area, and 1/2 bathroom for a total of 1300 sq feet.

The complex, the unit I'm looking at is the one on the left side of the picture

lots of windows

the neighborhood

Main floor which has only the living room and a coat closet

Standing in front of the fire place, stairs go up to the bedrooms and down to the kitchen and dining area. Behind my real estate agent is an area that is open to the dining area downstairs

2nd bedroom

bathroom attached to 2nd bedroom

Master bedroom

Master bathroom and walk in closet

stairs going down to the lower level. I would have the carpet replaced with wood at some point.

half bathroom on the lower level

dining area from the kitchen

kitchen from the dining area. The laundry room is to the left of the fridge

Standing in front of the windows on the lower level looking up

Pulling out of the driveway.. the view to the left

and the view to the right

1 block away from this park (the other building is about one mile away from here)

Thanks for reading.. sorry for the long post!! Please give me any advice that you have to offer!!!

I really like thee location of the first one.. and it just has more character than the condo building.. everyone that has seen the pics or even the units in person likes the 2nd one.. soo.....I made an offer on it this morning.. we'll see what happens!

I really like thee location of the first one.. and it just has more character than the condo building.. everyone that has seen the pics or even the units in person likes the 2nd one.. soo.....I made an offer on it this morning.. we'll see what happens!

Click to expand...

good luck

I was going to vote #2 as well. New construction is stylish but seems so cold and industrial, not very "homey"

I also like the loft sort of thing in the second place. And, not sure if you cook much but the kitchen in the condo is WAY small.

easily the 2nd one. although i do agree with the window in the closet thing being awesome haha. not a good view from the bottom floor for when youre eating breakfast though..but i guess neither one does heh